Legal question for our resident lawyers

If this is the wrong forum, then please accept my apologies (money? OT?)

Anyway...

I bought a smartphone from a guy on Craigslist 5 or 7 months ago

My carrier is Verizon - I called Verizon when I purchased and verified that the phone had a clean IMEI - transfered the phone to my account and used the phone for about a month or so

I wound up switching back to my old phone because the battery life was much better

I put the second hand phone on the shelf to use as a backup

So, my 6 year old poured a bottle of cleaning solution on my phone - the one that is active with my number

So I tried to reactivate my backup phone that I purchased months ago while the other one is getting repaired

Oops - the guy I bought from did not pay his bill

So verizon has my backup phone locked

They won't turn it on for me - they are telling me that if I bought from them, I would not have this problem

I called my lawyer and we are initiating a lawsuit

My thought is, once I check a phone and transfer it to my account, I should not be held hostage to someone else not paying their bill - again verizon had actually activated this phone on my account

I think there may be anti trust issues here

I Know it will cost them more to defend this than it would to clear this phone for my use (I have a legal plan and this will only cost me the court filing fees)

Verizon loses lawsuits with regularity (according to Google)

I understand protecting against stolen phones and scammed but I have been with Verizon for well over a decade and this is just shitty business, so I am moving forward with the lawsuit (crazy, I have never sued anyone before)

Thoughts?